When Chiming a Bell
by Just Look in the Mirror
Summary: One perilous bargain gone awry brings two House rivalries together, for the worst in her eyes, but the better in his. KB/MF
1. The Bet

**I've made Katie one year older in this story than in canon, (DOB: 1977ish) so in that sense, consider this AU. Otherwise, the plot and events are mostly consistent with J.K.'s story line.**

 **Main Pairings:**

 **Katie/Marcus  
** **Alicia/Adrian**

 **Standard Introductory Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. Rights to J.K. Rowling, of course.**

 **Rated M for mature language/dialogue and sexual content. Thoughts/concrit are welcome :)**

* * *

Some dialogue is borrowed from COS in this chapter.

* * *

 **Chapter One  
** _ **The Bet**_

Olive branches symbolize peace while Mars, in Roman mythology, is the god of war.

Flint stones can be used to smolder wood.

It was ironic, Katherine Bell observed, how Gryffindor's Quidditch Captain went by the name of

Oliver Wood while Slytherin's Captain went by Marcus Flint. It was even more ironic that Flint and Wood's relationship was one of two opposing soldiers on the battlefield in their acute dedication to their sport. Flint played his game with vigor and aggression, and Wood played his with strategy and grace.

From the first time the Captains had to shake the opponent's hand before their match, either had attempted to break the other's fingers, and thus, their ritual had commenced. According to Wood and Flint, Quidditch was a season of wholehearted war, all for the win and everything to lose. Their contrasting Houses only built on what sworn antagonism they shared.

The year earlier when Wood was a fifth year, newcomer Harry Potter had earned himself the Seeker's position on his team, subsequently leading them to their first glory in roughly seven years, thereby infuriating the Slytherin brute immeasurably. Flint gifted his enemy some flavorful expletives at their first lost game, but the second time Slytherin lost, he'd attempted to throttle the Scottish bloke. Flint had a dangerous temper, while Wood handled his disadvantages with a mature staunch, or so he'd try, but he'd usually end up tossing fists back at the other Captain in defense, especially when his prized Seeker took them to the win.

Marcus' flaming temperament was peripheral to Katie when she joined the Gryffindor team in the fall of 1989, as the then fourth year boy hadn't come into direct contact with the girl, initially. He stood out like a bull at a rodeo; she was among the audience, scowling while he rammed someone verbally or on occasion, physically. Katie would deem the brutish Slytherin a barbarian and would pay little more heed towards him.

At the start of her fourth year, however, Katie was targeted and tangled into a series of catcalls with her best friends and fellow Gryffindor dorm-mates, Alicia Spinnet and Angelina Johnson, when the feud between Wood and Flint gravitated for hell. Flint would mockingly label the other Captain's three Chasers Wood's "whores", but Wood in turn would hurl back heated jibes of how Flint had zero girls on his team, thereby verifying him a "homosexual, sexist chauvinist."

It seemed Spinnet and Johnson took their servings of sexual remarks and insults of their feminine inferiority with sharp snorts and a roll of the eyes. If they ever did take minor offense, their darker skin tones would conceal the blush, Bell noticed, once Slytherins' Graham Montague and Miles Bletchley teamed up to scheme only the filthiest of hoots and hollers for the girly trio, namely to incense and distract Wood. Opposingly, Bell was as pale as a porcelain doll's arse, and her flushing cheeks would show clearly, sometimes provoking the lewd snaky gits furthermore when they'd notice. Spinnet and Johnson would chastise their more sensitive, albeit pragmatic friend not to take their childish nonsense too seriously.

One Saturday some weeks into the girls' fourth year, Wood had the pitch pre-booked for practice, unbeknownst, on a morning when heaping seriousness would erect in his entire team. The seven players had exited the boys' locker room where the very awake and enthused Wood had covered that practice's program. The Captain strolled onto the game field with an early bird swagger that irked his players somewhat as they were all still thoroughly weary. He mounted his broom with energized steadiness and took flight swiftly while the others groggily copied his lead. Their plans were in motion for perhaps three minutes before the unwelcome approached. Wood was the first to spy his utmost enemy, and he was the first to return to the ground and confront the nearing snakes with interrogating venom.

"Whaddya think you're doing, Flint?! We got up specially! You can beat it now!"

"Plenty of room for all of us, Wood," Flint replied darkly.

"BUT I BOOKED THE PITCH!" Wood roared as if he were aflame. "I BOOKED IT!"

"Well, I got a specially signed note here from Professor Snape," Flint said, waving a small scroll in his opponent's face.

"Lemme see that!" Wood snatched the parchment from the bulkier boy's grasp. He unrolled it speedily to read, "I, Professor Severus Snape, give the Slytherin team permission to practice today owing to the need to train their new Seeker…" He glared up, his eyes dissecting the crowd ahead donned in green uniform. "You've got a new Seeker? What happened to Higgs?"

"Not that he's any of your concern, but we agreed his continued participation wouldn't be...necessary," Flint supplied. "Besides, our new one's promising enough."

"Yeah?" Wood scoffed. "So who is the snot?"

Flint and several of his players stepped aside so that Draco Malfoy, a snotty varmint indeed, could reveal himself with a self-loving simper.

"Lucius Malfoy's brat?" Fred Weasley said with a hint's incredulity.

"Funny you should bring up his father," Flint interjected. "Let me show you the generous gift he's contributed to our team." He, along with the rest of his crew, poked a shiny, black, state-of-the-art Nimbus Two Thousand and One into the earth for emphasis while each Gryff gaped. Wood was practically frothing at the mouth now upon drinking the sight in, his blood probably boiling. "Very latest model. Just came out last month, in fact. Believe it outstrips the old, splintered and worn Cleansweeps by a vast amount."

The Gryffs went cricket-silent as Flint's disparaging words sunk in. When the Slyths had themselves a hearty snicker, Katie's frustration rose to almost meet Wood's. A sharp remark born and fresh in her head, she brushed past George Weasley and refuted, "They're just a placebo, you know. Those things don't really work any better or go any faster than our worn-out 'Sweeps. They only will if you truly believe in your heart they're capable."

"So you believe," Flint said over the Gryffs' laughter. "Shall we put that weak theory to the test this instant?"

"What're those losers doing here?" Malfoy snorted as Potter's best friends, Hermione Granger and Ronald Weasley, hurried through the field to encounter them.

"What's happening?" Ron asked Harry, narrowing his sights onto Draco to gasp, dismayed. "Don't tell me he's a part of their team now?!"

"I am the new Slytherin Seeker, Weasel," Malfoy informed bitterly, shooting a referring glance at his broom. "Everyone's admiring the top-of-the-line, latest edition in Nimbus broomsticks my father's bought the entire team." He, accompanied with the elder snakes, chuckled as they absorbed yet another stunned reaction of jealousy. "Good aren't they? But oi, maybe the Gryffindor team can raise some gold and get new brooms too. You could raffle off those ancient Cleansweep Fives. Suspect some museum would bid for 'em."

The Slytherins cackled.

"At least no one on the Gryffindor team had to buy their way in," bushy-haired second year, Granger, put forth. "They made it based on their pure talent."

Gryffindor's three Chasers beamed at the girl proudly.

"No one asked your opinion, you filthy little Mudblood," Malfoy spat cruelly.

A melee had bloomed. Flint took a protective dive for the charging Weasley twins, their target, his scrawny Seeker.

"How DARE you!" shrieked Alicia, stomping for the prattish blond boy.

"Arrogant, bigot-bred blighter!" Angelina intervened.

"The nasty little shite!" Katie bonused, about simmering.

Momentarily, a brilliant green light burst in Katie's sidelong view. She craned her neck to watch Ron fly across the lawn—to land roughly on his rear. The Gryffindors sprinted to the shot ginger, Potter, Granger and the twins ahead of everybody else. Seconds later, a loud belch broke into the air as Ron upchucked a fat, slime-soaked slug.

While the Slytherins spasmed in their hard guffawing, Hermione and Harry rushed to help their hexed mate to his feet. They aided him off the pitch and towards Hagrid's, a spread-out trail of slugs left behind. Sniggers still taunted the lions' ears as the tense air dispersed around them for an ephemeral length of time. Wood's ongoing anger pierced a snapping point and he marched for Flint, his wand at the ready.

"Off the pitch, you lot!"

"What are you going to do, Wood?" Flint chortled, wheezing slightly, having laughed for such a duration his chest had to be wearing on him. "You can't hex me, not without landing your arse in trouble. Also, my Head of House's permit to us ousts your 'booking' by a plentiful lot."

"You did this on purpose!" Wood accused, his whole body shaking and shading burgundy. "You saw that I had my team pre-signed for this morning and you ambled along to annoy us and try to sneak peeks at our game plan! Hadn't you the sulky bastard's confirmation, you still would have cruised out here this morning to do what you did!"

"But I do have the sulky bastard's confirmation, you blabbering blood-traitor," Flint spat wickedly. "Therefore, I get the field, or at least half of it. Why don't we be good sports and settle our differences this moment, eh?" He moved his black glints onto Katie, scowling. "I'd like to prove our brooms' quality to your little charlatan Chaser."

"You keep Katie and all my players out of your devious ploys!" Wood hissed, either fist purpling from his peaking rage. "If you don't hightail your tight arses out of here in ten blasted seconds, I'm going to report you lot off to McGonagall!"

"Now you're just being a hypocrite," Flint scoffed. "I have the same jurisdiction you do to report you to Snape."

George and Fred then embraced their Captain and clutched onto him for dear life in efforts to halt his mad progression for the other Captain. Flint and his boys snickered some more, shaking their heads at the past five minutes' hilarious and richly eventful pitch fiasco. At least the Gryffs could all say they were wide-awake now.

o0o0o0o

Conclusively, both teams had ended up practicing that morning. Katie had reckoned her placebo claim correct, as the snakes hadn't gone much faster after all than they used to using the 'Sweeps. Minimal cooperation had roused between either Captain, though they'd eventually concurred on dividing the field. In short time, Flint and his players had evidently crossed over the 'division line' onto Wood's share. Fists were thrown by ten a.m., once Wood's patience and tolerance had emptied absolutely. Word traveled and Wood received his serving of detentions by Snape and Flint got his helping from McGonagall.

Katie and Alicia lounged on their common room's couch that evening, aching somewhat from their flaunted endurance on the pitch. They ridiculed their Captain's harsh militant-ish technique and deemed Quidditch more just a game than anything more, while Wood thought differently, and perhaps rightly so, as he was aspiring passionately to join the Scottish National Quidditch Team after graduating.

"Stinks we have to get up disgustingly early tomorrow morn too," Alicia sighed. "I like Oliver, we all do, but he's damn obsessed with the sport."

"Affirmative," Katie murmured. "Let us pray today's ghastly interference doesn't repeat itself."

"I'd lay odds it will. Seems to me Flint might have a crush on our Wood. Seeing as how he hounded him like a lost pup out there. Well, that hadn't been his first time doing such."

"I'd say it's the other way around," yawned Katie. "Oliver was straight up in that ugly moron's face, utterly puce and unhinged. You could tell the walking atrocity gets Wood all hot and feral."

"I dunno about that, Kate. You saw the way he defended your honor when Flint was throwing sneers at you. The bloke was on fire! I'd never seen him more enraged."

"Arseholes will be arseholes," Katie shrugged. "As you and Ange recommended, I try not to take anything those evil snakes spit to heart."

"I hope they took to heart your note of their extravagant duds. I'd hate to see them excel on those things from sheer faith they actually boost your momentum. I'd imagine they'd be disqualified from the game if they really were."

"Yes, as it would likely qualify as cheating," Katie mused. "So, is Ron Weasley doing better?"

"I think so. He just had to wait-out the effects, unfortunately. There's no relieving antidote for those kinds of spells."

"It's a right shame he missed that awful Malfoy git. He's twelve and already thinks his pedestal's higher than everyone else's."

"It's a greater shame there's more of those supreme bullies to come yet. Draco's only bound to rub off that snooty dominance on his future sprogs."

"Aye, it saddens me to think that even fifteen, twenty years from now, the blood status contention will be just the grave dilemma it is in this age."

"Or possibly worse," Alicia said grimly.

"I'm not particularly one to stereotype, but I swear, each single pureblood Slytherin is worthless. Nothing but a load of good-for-zilch tyrants who get off on drowning their 'lessers' with their witless jests of condescension."

"Amen," Alicia groaned. "May they all one day rot in the pits of hell."

o0o0o0o

Marcus departed his sentenced detention fuming to the high heavens. Wood had Merlin to thank for having his detention set outdoors with the oafy gamekeeper, Hagrid, and not with Filch, polishing up the dusty trophy cases. The eighteen-year-old Slyth pledged to beat the soul out of his opponent in their next confrontation regardless of the consequences.

Wood aside, his focus clung to the words of that pissy little girl, Bell. How had she the audacity to insist the high-in-demand, recently bloody released Nimbus Two Thousand and fucking Ones were but mere 'placebos'. Nothing more to them than what the owner hoped for? His arse! In the trial spin he'd taken upon achieving the device he could straightaway discern its enhancements from the standard Cleansweeps. The tweaks were substantial! Had they not been, he would have tried to refuse Mr. Malfoy's desperate request that he let his precious son onto the team and kept his beyond-adequate Seeker, Higgs, aboard. Then there wouldn't have even been a need to toss that acquaintanceship out the window.

"Confused bint," he muttered to himself, now ascending the second flight of moving stairs, bent on reaching the seventh where, rumor had it, the Gryffindor tower was located. He hadn't known for sure because he'd stuck mostly to his comfort zones down in the dungeons where the atmosphere was dark, chilly and appetizingly eerie, thereby quite satisfying in his twisted book.

Tonight, Marcus was apt to stomp from his more cozy whereabouts since Wood's pretty yet very ignorant Chaser was due for a strict, private, one-on-one discussion with him: the Quidditch tactic and merchandise extraordinaire as well as the Falmouth Falcons' eventual Captain. He didn't know if Bell was itching to play the sport for means of stardom and income someday, but he didn't care one speck. That wasn't why he was storming up to her, closing more distance between them by the tick.

As nine o'clock p.m. crept up, few of the younger Gryffs littered the corridors, but luckily, some did. He would only need the service of one anyway. He seized the first kiddie in his proximity upon stepping onto the seventh floor and he glued him in place with his large mitts alone, effectively scaring the boy shitless.

"Do you know Katie Bell?" Marcus asked lowly, the 'brave' Gryff trembling like a leaf in the wind in turn.

"I - I do," he stammered.

"Go fetch the lady from your common room. Don't tell her who sent you."

"You're...not planning to hurt her, are you?" questioned the boy with what obviously minuscule valiance he bore.

'I might torture her some...'

"I just want a word. Unless you don't see much potential in your nut sacs, I'd hop to it."

He released the youngster to watch him zoom for the Fat Lady, trusting the skinny blonde fourth year would emerge give a minute or so. He'd wait out here all night if he had to.

…

"Yes, I think Wood's grudge against Flint associates with Flint's biased views on blood purity, and vice-versa. I mean, Wood's views on people, whether Muggle, Muggle-born, half-blood, pureblood, the whole platter, are normal, so why wouldn't the jagged-toothed troll consider him anything less than someone who deserves a premature demise?"

"The war, it lives on," Katie sighed dismally. "Why are we still talking about them? Shouldn't we be covering our visit to Hogsmeade after slaving over the Captain's orders at practice tom-"

A gentle index finger tapping her shoulder drew her out of her statement. She turned around to face a nervous first year boy. "S-somebody wants to see y-you...outside the portrait hole," he said tensely.

"Oh? Um, who?" She frowned in thought. Was it Leanne, her Hufflepuff pal? Odd for her to stop by the portrait at this hour... "Is it a girl, Leanne?"

The kid went white as Binns, shaking his head timidly, then walking away suddenly and speedily, as if spooked. Katie shrugged, rising and murmuring a BRB to Ali. She exited the common room with paltry caution, for she was certain it was Leanne waiting outside, desperate to gain the Gryff's condolences once more since her boyfriend had dumped her not long ago.

However, she'd stepped out to see someone she'd not ever seen on this floor to date, and with the sight partnered a bad feeling. Taking in a hearty breath and sporting a calm facade, she crossed her arms and met the older Slytherin where he skulked halfway down the hall.

"What?" she asked casually, in no mood for a skirmish tonight.

"Walk with me, Bell," he said, heading the opposite direction. "We need to talk."

"No, curfew's five minutes away. Tell me what you need to here, and make it quick."

He put up a mean glower for her. "Just walk beside me for a wee stroll, you goody-two-shoe'd princess."

"That won't be the slightest bit requisite," she argued. "What the hell is it?"

"I found your placebo speculation rather fucking inane, Bell," he snarled, plodding up to her, glaring daggers while. "I wanna know what gave you such a retarded idea."

"Drop it if it bothers you this much."

"What makes you think the Nimbuses are faulty?"

"I know they are because they wouldn't be allowed for game-play if they were built to fly faster and perfect your agility. Their benefit would only label them swindlers tools. I'll admit my assumption isn't totally reliable, but-"

"But? No, I get it, sweetheart. You've just tried to wheedle my crew into failure by assuring us that our top caliber brooms actually don't do shite for us. Our gifts were expensive, so expensive, that Mr. Malfoy wouldn't tell me how much he invested in them. They must work to some extent of magnitude, and since they do, you can expect to lose our first game by an astronomical gap in the final score. I'd warn you to maintain a wary guard when we're in the sky next month, but since you're the adversary, I couldn't give a damn for your security or health."

"I'll tell you what, Flint," she snapped, her defiance practically reverberating. "I'm so confident we will win our match, that I'm willing to make a bet with you on it."

"Is that right?" he said, his smirk derisive. "Alright. If you're so certain your little Seeker's going to bring you triumph again, let's vow on it."

A blonde brow quirked. "Vow?"

"You know," he leant in to whisper, "the Unbreakable Vow."

"Don't be foolish! We can't do that! It's illegal for one thing, and-"

"It isn't," he countered slyly, "but it carries just the risk you seem bold enough to go forth with." He chuckled as her face burned scarlet. "Unless I'm mistaken. It's fine with me if you'd like to back out now and admit that we Slytherins just might have at that outnumbering score this game."

"Very well, you proud bugger," she cut in hotly, her reluctance quite transparent. "Behind that alcove, then." She pointed ahead to a pillar where they wouldn't be seen easily as long as they were quiet and quick. "So the loser is to surrender ten galleons. I can only hope you pay through your end of the deal...You are aware of the consequences of breaking your promise?" she asked sternly, her back against the corridor's cool stone wall.

"Of course. Only've done a hundred before with my mates and miscellaneous sources," he answered. "And if you're as sure as you think you are, then I'd like to wager something far more worthy than ten galleons."

"Twenty?" she suggested nonchalantly.

"I've an alternative dare, but why don't you declare your condition of me first."

"Your fee'd twenty galleons suits me fine. So what is yours of me?"

He smiled with profound malice, baring his horrifically aligned and gigantic teeth. "If Gryffindor loses, you must meet me in one of Filch's closets and blow me."

"Pardon?!" she gasped, reddening with fury and abashment, as if his regulation was one of great shock coming from a vile, conceited Slytherin.

"Suddenly don't sound so positive there, Bell."

"Propose something else," she growled.

"There shouldn't be a need to, right? Minutes ago you were foreseeing your team's victory, were you not?" he reasoned snidely.

Huffing her building indignation through her nostrils, she hastily reminded herself of how bloody good Potter was in the air. He'd managed to catch the Snitch twice the last year as a mere first year, and they'd only lost that final match because the boy was unconscious in the infirmary. He seemed a real talent thus far. Not to mention Wood's overbearing practice homework and ridiculous crack-of-dawn pitch bookings solidified their upcoming victories moreover. Harry iced the cake. They would win. There was almost no way they wouldn't.

She grabbed his wrist and nodded for him to commence. Gryffindor wins, she earns twenty galleons. Slytherin wins, she gets to desecrate her dignity and a portion of her innocence on her knees for approximately ten minutes in a dark storage closet after the match, before the clock chimed midnight the same day, as the snake added on.

"Meet me in the prefect's bathroom tomorrow at five. Password's Crescent Bezoar."

"Why don't we just get it over with now?"

"We need a Bonder. Might not work without one."

"A Bonder? What's that?"

"The one who'll bond us, Bell," he scoffed. "Who else?"

"So somebody else has to cast the spell?"

"Yep."

"But this is a personal matter, Flint! I don't want people knowing about this ludicrous deal."

"Mm, if you're too shy, I understand."

"No - no, we're doing it. I'm looking forward to having your money. There's a pair of pricey shoes at Gladrags I've been eyeing.

"And I'm looking forward to your muffled hums."

She flushed rose. "Pervert."

"I'll let you change up the bargain a bit," he offered. "If you don't wish to eat my cock, you may spread your pretty legs for me instead."

'Libidinous bastard!' her brain screamed.

"Keep it as it is," she muttered tersely. If, by infinitesimal prospect, misfortune struck and she did lose the bet, she'd rather preserve her virginity for someone virtuous.

But Gryffindor would win.


	2. Payment of Defeat

**!** This chapter contains a lemon towards the end that may be viewed as dub-con.

* * *

 **Chapter Two  
** _ **Payment of Defeat**_

"Crescent Bezoar."

Katie was shuddering keenly as she entered the fourth floor's luxurious bath which was restricted to prefects and Quidditch Captains. Four shifty eyes ogled upon her while she shut the door behind her, it auto-locking and subtly warning the back of her mind that there was no backing out of this now. This situation felt so final. It was nearly taking a toll on her.

' _What in Godric's name am I really doing?'_

Her Gryffish valor and stubbornness be damned.

"Excellent to see you didn't chicken out, Bell," Marcus said, sporting a smirk that urged her powerfully to smack him silly. "Hate to have you kneel a little prematurely," he began sadistically, his fellow Chaser and designated Bonder, Adrian Pucey, snorting at the innuendo, "but the Vow requires both parties on their knees for some reason."

"Whatever," she sighed, her heart hissing at her to vacate and avoid such dire ramifications as death and doing sexual favors for gross enemies, but her mind, her intransigent, obstinate mind…

She stepped before the taller and older student and they knelt simultaneously, one to clasp the other's right hand. The tip of Pucey's wand laid over their linked hands, two thin ruby glows to issue from it and slither around their wrists. Suddenly, Katie's often suppressed inner cowardice surfaced and she would have bolted had Flint's grip on her wrist not been so sturdy.

"Er, will you, Kathleen Be-"

"Kath _erine_ ," Katie corrected crisply, glaring at both boys.

"...Will you, Katherine Bell, perform fellatio on Marcus Flint prior to midnight on the fourteenth of November if the Slytherin Quidditch team outscores Gryffindor and wins the match?" Pucey stated, keeping formal.

Her chest sank, as if someone had stuffed a bag of rocks inside her esophagus. "...Yes."

Marcus was beaming ostentatiously, his expression nauseating the girl to about puking.

"And do you, Marcus Flint, swear you'll pay Katherine Bell precisely twenty galleons prior to midnight on the fourteenth of November if the Gryffindor Quidditch team outscores Slytherin and wins the match?"

"Yeah, certainly," Marcus said smugly.

"That all, man?" Pucey asked.

"We're done. Thanks," Marcus replied.

Pucey wordlessly ended the incantation and withdrew his wand once the glowing strips faded.

o0o0o0o

The days following up to November fourteenth had Katie drastically paranoid. She'd come to slightly regret hastily participating in a controversial Unbreakable Vow with Marcus. Frequent practice with her team provided some aplomb, and Potter was quite adroit and nimble for his age and experience, but the fear lingered that the Gryffs just could lose, however improbable the possibility.

Katie had kissed but one boy, Ravenclaw Prefect Robert Hilliard, the year antecedent, but their brief bond had died months ago, now officially unrequited. Alicia had been eager to set her up with this bloke or that one, but Katie rather desired going about her personal affairs solo. There was no rush. She'd just turned fifteen that August. She was quite chaste compared to Ali or even Ange. She liked to read, soar the skies and concentrate on her schoolwork. Boyfriends and fornicating rendezvouses could wait a while.

Or so she'd strive for it to. Well, the taxing preparations with Wood and the others were fated to suffice by the day of the year's first game. She'd be pocketing a simple twenty galleons proceeding the match. Any anxiety would psychosomatically hinder her own technique on the pitch, she reminded herself steely. That bet, however reckless, was fruitful in instilling her mountainous assurance. She'd come to give a lighthearted smile at the thought that he was anticipating her lewd gesticulations, but the niggling concern that she should've modified the gamble with a _snog_ instead galled her conscious here and there too.

' _Calm down...Harry'll have the Snitch...He will.'_

There was naught to fret.

o0o0o0o

"You alright, Katie? You're white as one of my grandmum's handkerchiefs," Angelina observed, dressing into her uniform with Katie and Alicia in their locker room.

"...Just feeling a tad uneasy this morning. I'm okay," Katie answered weakly, fixing her hair into a tight ponytail.

"Well, it is our first game of the season. My stomach's always a little jumpy pre-game," Ange confessed.

"It shouldn't be. We're gonna win, you oughta know!" Ali exclaimed buoyantly.

"She's right," Katie said with an edgy undertone. "Potter's with us, fit and spry. Surely ready to snatch that Snitch," she added with a nervous laugh.

"Spry? Isn't that word more fitting to describe a vigorous old person?" Ange chortled.

"Could be," Katie murmured, closing her locker and peering at the exit, agitation gnawing ruthlessly within.

"Wood's awaiting us," Ange sighed, prepping herself for his annual 'play this game for the victory like your life depends on it' speech. He'd rant all the ten minutes they had to spare before Hooch whistled for them to retreat. "We best hustle."

Ali and Ange jogged for the door, but Katie paced out gradually. Hustling was the last thing she wanted to do.

…

Marcus was practically glowing in his locker room, his shaft stiffening as it did preliminary to every game, but fiercer this one than usual. Intermittent and somewhat eidetic flashes of the cute Gryffindor blonde knelt in front of him and sucking him off enthusiastically screened over in his cunning mind while he strapped his left kneepad on. The visual was probably slightly exaggeratory, for he'd wager his father's whole bank that Bell was still virginal in all aspects, much unlike himself, who was prepossessing enough to get into the hideous knickers' of Helga Bulstrode and Agatha Crabbe. It wasn't exaggeratory in the sense that he would be having her mouth later on that very day. He'd see to himself and his boys competing out there like Salazar-forsaken mercenaries.

"Now we're gonna make out there like we're trying-out for the bloody Falcons, gentlemen," the Captain announced, standing before his seated audience of six players. "We used to own this sport before that little scar-headed blood-traitor came along to aid Wood with his deficient presentations." He eyed his comrade Chasers, Pucey and Graham. "I expect to see many points earned from your goaling. Fucking Cob those Quaffles outta the bitches arms if you must." He took in their curt nods and stared at his new Seeker austerely enough to make the kid quiver. "Bear in mind our chat of last night, Draco. Hound Potter all game. Don't dare to slow up. If he's within a petty inch's distance of _your_ Snitch, you make sure Hooch isn't watching and you Blurt or Blatch the shit till the winged ball is snug in _your_ grip."

Draco nodded fastidiously with wide intimidated eyes. The junior repeated his Captain's earlier intimidations in his head. Marcus had warned the blond that his pubescent, un-dropped testicles would be kicked up inside him if he let Potty get _their_ Snitch and ultimately win Gryffindor the game. Draco was a sure-fire and assertive boy with just the humongous ego his fellow Slyths possessed, but Flint's malicious threats had spooked a trickle of piss from him and made him sort of rue begging Father to get him a spot on the team.

Adrian recognized his mate's fervid aggression and took it with an inward chuckle once Marcus dismissed them out to the field. He reckoned he was either broke or fancied Bell's mouth more than what was normal when there were older, prettier and looser girls amid them.

"Really want that blowjob, don't you?" Adrian mumbled to Marcus as they walked onto the pitch to bathe in the spectators' greeting cheers.

"Not only that," Marcus grumbled, leering suggestively across the field at Bell who approached with her companion Chasers behind Wood, the Weasel twins and Potter. "I need it."

o0o0o0o

Katie evaded the Slytherin Chasers and frantically goaled as many Quaffles as she feasibly could. Such was onerous when the rim of your billowing robe's were clutched and jerked at consistently. Ali and Ange were facing the same problem. Further complications involved a rogue Bludger that pursued Harry for the match's duration. At some points it almost whacked Draco as he flew straight alongside Wood's Seeker, both Seekers itching terribly to capture the Snitch. Her attention was glued to her role's objective, but hearing Commentator Lee Jordan's vocalizations of Harry's apprehensive progress dizzied her with the painful possibility that Gryffindor might not succeed.

Thus, they were eleven points ahead of Slytherin, but that would all alter significantly contingent on whichever Seeker caught the restive Snitch. Most of the enemies were committing a foul of some variety, Katie noticed, as surely directed by their perverted Captain, speaking of whom was trying arduously to Blag her right off her broom mid-air, it seemed.

' _Not like I could even give him head if I were paralyzed or dead,'_ she bitterly mused, spiraling and dashing blurrily while Flint tailed her not far behind. She was surprised Hooch hadn't at least suspended any of the technical-fouling snakes yet.

Perhaps fifteen minutes into the game, the corrupt Bludger had finally whammed into the speeding Gryffindor Seeker's back, effectively hurling him off course to strike the ground from seventeen feet above. Purportedly Draco had pushed Harry towards the incoming iron ball, granting him a stellar chance at seizing the tiny gold one.

At Jordan's forlorn announcement, bile upsurged in Katie's gullet and she'd sworn she'd faint upon landing. Fortuitously, she did not, and she galloped off the pitch alone.

o0o0o0o

"Bloody Merlin!"

Tearing through the fifth book on dark curses in the library's Restricted Section, this one inconveniently without an index, her heart raced, generating her acute bout of hyperventilation as she sought the page entailing the Unbreakable Vow.

She'd hid in here straightaway following the game's bewildering outcome. You didn't have to know Flint well to assume the library was not a hangout of his. Katie doubted heavily he'd meander in here. As the clock ticked on, she also began to formidably doubt there was a counter-curse or some method—any method—that would reverse her thoughtless vow. Her life was now literally on the line, and there was no way in Hades she could abide what she—jokingly—promised to perform _if_ Slytherin beat the Gryffs. That _if_ , according to her, had been taken none too seriously.

From what she'd perused so far, the Unbreakable Vow was a very permanent and final incantation. Each tome the library discussed on it summed the curse as 'fatal if broken.' She temporarily considered asking Madam Pince if she acknowledged anything her selection didn't cover, but declined from actually doing so in case that raised suspicion.

She thought to get her hands on a time-turner, for she knew a handful of studious students who owned the device, but she dejectedly recalled they only safely reversed time by five hours maximum. She'd undergone the Vow roughly a month ago.

' _Blast!'_

Tears coated. While Harry was suffering in the infirmary she was cooped up in the library futilely hunting for something that would cancel the UV. She'd only ten hours until her heart froze in her chest so she could topple over cold and quite deceased, but in that space of time, if she lived up to her end of the bargain and defiled her modest spirits, the spell would stall naturally. Nevertheless, Katie respected herself and she was virtually more inclined to accepting an untimely demise over doing anything intimate with a Slytherin, especially with a neanderthal like Flint. Concurrently she couldn't just chuck her life away because her hesitance to orally please the bloke was gigantic.

Immensely defeated, frustrated and nauseated, she restocked every book she'd skated through to retake her seat at a vacant table. With nobody around, she contemplated on the situation, vividly so as to ready herself for the legitimate. Neither of her best mates had admitted to tackling the act, though among the trio, Katie had presumed the extroverted Ali to test such first with her Hufflepuff beau, but perhaps not for a year or two. They were fifteen for crying out loud. The only penises they should have been seeing were the ones in anatomy textbooks. For kicks the girls had sought the page in a muggle biology edition over a summer in Katie's hometown public library. The diagram had them giggling like the immature twelve-year-olds they then were.

The visual she had running lasted for maybe fifteen seconds before her heart was palpitating and her airways were constricting. She inhaled deeply and richly, pondering furiously how she was to free herself from this muck. Could she stage another UV with Flint, somehow undoing and taking back their prior spoken oaths? She scrapped that idea about as soon as she'd concocted it. For starters, the boy wouldn't yield to nixing his kinky appointment that he'd so obviously hankered for, and a second Vow likely wouldn't have topped or vetoed any spoken terms in their first one.

Ultimately, she was confined to this.

"What the hell is wrong with me?!" she muttered silently, cupping her palms over her watery eyes. Her boldness had paraded its mammoth consequences for the utter worst now. She may have been uber certain that Gryffindor would have their triumph once again, but agreeing and Vowing to what she did was greatly superfluous!

' _What happened?'_ she thought, replaying that day's match in her head. Of course Slytherin was particularly harsh, as wonted, but something was off...that Bludger. It mauled after Harry like it'd been tampered with.

"That treacherous troll!"

So Flint hexed the Bludger, had he? Held hopes so low that his team would not succeed that he stooped to fraudulence? Hooch would be enlightened to this!...had it not been a mere speculation, Katie despondently reminded herself. She hadn't any firm evidence that he'd done it, her high conviction irrelevant, tragically.

The clock not slowing nor ceasing, she swept at her fallen tears and rose to her feet. Formerly declared words reiterated in her mind as she exited the library, onward for her dorm, then eventually to the corridors to confront the unsightly bastard, capitulate her tongue and throat and mar pieces of her being. She had to " _just get it over with"_ after all.

o0o0o0o

The dungeons were bustling with delight (and minor shock) that Slytherin had won their first game against Gryffindor in over a year. Celebration wafted about their snake hole (common room) and gossip wildfired around that even morose Prof Snape donned a short-lived smile once it'd become apparent that his House had outscored and hence _won_.

Snickery chuckles of the pellucidly rogued Bludger was of popular topic as was Potter's present condition in the hospital wing where his sprained, Bludger-thwacked spine was hopefully giving him enough hell to make him consider quitting Quidditch. Such wasn't probable, but a snake could dream.

An overjoyed—and enormously relieved—Draco sat with the cool older kids on the verdant settee with his Captain, Pucey, and a Beater whose name he hadn't a clue of. When the discussion spotlit the turned-out talented Seeker, a big hand patted his upper back partnered with a congratulatory, "Well done, kid."

"Don't mention it, Captain," Draco beamed, his cheeks pinkening in flattery. "Catching the little bugger was elementary with that Bludger so interested in Potter."

"Ah, but I'm sure you would have caught it anyway even if rigged luck hadn't been ours today," Flint noted sternly, causing the youngster to blanch.

"Indeed," Draco meekly croaked, submerging into his cushion cowardly.

Marcus struggled to contain his mirth. He shifted his gaze onto his other two exemplary Chasers. "You lot would've made the Falcon's Captain Horton one proud bastard. I bet he would've written down your names for later contact."

Adrian and Graham grinned, also flattered.

"Say, Marcus," Adrian mumbled beside him. "It's pushing nine. Don't tell me you've forgotten about your...wager regarding a specific Gryffindor."

"No way I would," Marcus smiled. "The bitch has a few hours to surrender still. Doubt she's salivating to get in my trousers, much as I wish she was."

"You sound infatuated with the girl," Adrian observed teasingly.

"There a problem if I am?" the troll descendant nearly snapped.

"Not with me," Adrian defended. "Not like you're swooning in-love with the bint."

"Course not," he affirmed smoothly. "Just like how you're not with Spinnet." He blinked in his mate's scowl, biting back a mocking laugh. He rolled his head leisurely against the back of the couch, his concentration wandering to Bell's disputatious lips and how they would soon be swathed around his turgid cock. A moment's fantasizing had the organ twitching wickedly within the confines of his undergarments. He'd waited sufficiently, he decided, as he took his stand. "Well, guess I better go find her," he said casually, his feet then swift for the exit.

o0o0o0o

Wood's dissatisfied roars circulated the Gryffindor common room as Katie descended the stairway from the girls' dormitories. His Beaters, Fred and George, were showered with their Captain's scoldings apropos to their "sloppy and lazy-arsed club swings", causing them a sizable deficit in points. Chasers' Alicia and Angelina were doused in criticism on their "middling dodges and graceless goal-post aim".

Katie ducked to perch on the last step to go unnoticed by her ongoingly rampaging boss. He hollered on to excuse Potter, for he was playing fairly well until the meddled Bludger walloped the pitiable kid promptly off his broom too suddenly for him to elude it. Wood voiced his conjecture that one of the snakes hexed the iron sphere, concurring nods to return, Katie's discreetly included.

The Scot boasted on for what Katie discerned to be forty minutes. Her caution furthered as the clock did, the time she had left slimming down by the sec. Where would the vindictive hector even lurk? There must have been at least fifty closets in the castle as a whole.

When Wood dismissed himself with a conclusive sigh of exasperation, his absent Chaser veered for the exit, her desperation to figure a way out of this flourishing with each stride.

…

' _You got yourself into this, you daft cretin!'_ her brain barked, as the reality of the situation dawned vengefully. Feverish symptoms settled in whenever she heard a distant, heavy footfall up ahead or beyond the corner's connected corridor. Her lungs pumped ruggedly and her lighthead heated like a stove top hall after hall. She'd never been this nerve-wracked in her life. Her distress eventually incapacitated her to having to stop in her walking to lean against the stone wall. At this hour she belonged tucked into her bed socializing with Ali and Ange, not wandering the corridors to pay her dues trollop-style.

The dim sight of the hallway morphed to blackness splotched with squiggly phosphenes once she curtained her lids over her stinging, teary eyes. She'd yet to get over with what she literally had to, but the truth was so emotionally sickening her ducts switched on indiscriminately, shaming her usual chivalrous Gryff facet.

' _I'll curse him right when it's done,'_ she thought, clutching her wand resistantly. ' _And I'll let him find me.'_ She slid down to meet her bum with the cold floor. A huge part of her would rather kiss death than the privates of such a loathsome tyrant who owned teeth so misshapen and crooked someone who didn't know of his dishonorable behavioral background or troll ancestry would pity him.

She sat curled up against the fifth floor's righthand wall for perhaps half an hour, subconsciously choosing to kiss death another day. She flinched not when familiar treads neared to subsequently halt in her vicinity.

"There you fucking are."

He was flustered she could tell. He'd probably been searching for her all the rest of the day after the game, the greedy git. She kept her face buried in her thighs. She'd no intention of even looking at him.

"Well, come on, Bell. We haven't a lot of time, and it can take me a while to cum."

Her stomach twinged at his shameless words. She regarded so much revolt for him it confused her somewhat as to how it was possible. This man here was a royal son of a supreme bitch.

"Bell," he muttered warningly, barely skimming her silky tresses before she shrieked and swatted his paw away.

"Don't you dare touch me!" she howled, madly scooting along the wall to lengthen their distance. "I won't do it."

"You will," he corrected. "Unless you've tired of living."

"You're vile!" she snapped, clambering further out. "Had I the tiniest inkling Slytherin would actually win-"

"Doesn't matter now, luv," he interrupted contently. "Your dogged House valor drowned out your wiseness, didn't it? You were so stubborn and sure of yourself that you easily agreed to go south on me."

"You cheated!" she said bitterly. "You bewitched that Bludger so it would injure Harry and access your Seeker to the Snitch!"

"Wasn't me, Bell," he grumbled, his eyes glinting with earnest. "Dunno who made it like that, but I'm bloody thankful for it."

"You're getting _nothing_ from me!"

"You'll die if you don't, you naive wench."

"I'll accept that."

Bulky fingers delved through her locks to collect a handful and yank upwards—hurling her to her feet and dragging her towards the closet nearest. Her feet too clumsy and numb to venture an escape, she crashed into the end wall of a very cramped room, or rather, space with a door.

The capacity's temperature escalated by what felt like thirty degrees as she was colloportus'ed in with five feet and ten inches of brawny body heat-radiating flesh. His arms locked themselves around the small of her back, enveloping her scrawnier frame with such hunger and force the wind was knocked from her. Protectively, she latched onto his jaw and repelled him with her spasming arms. His strength was overwhelming, however, and hot pants were moistening her neck instantly.

"I refuse to let you kick the bucket over something so trivial," he muttered against the shell of her left ear.

"Oh, you care for me or getting your willie sucked?" His response laid in his irregular breaths stroking over her sensitive neck. She shifted uncomfortably as his thick fingers combed her hair tenderly. This was so immoral; founded on a mere accusation of artificially enhanced broomsticks and their inducing placebo effects on the user. "Had it been Alicia or Angelina to mention-"

"But it wasn't, Bell. You couldn't refrain from blurting out your vapid opinions and neither could that Mudblood-"

"Don't use that awful word, you derogatory arse!"

"S'pose protesting is another Gryffish feature. Just can't help yourself, can you?"

"Can you help your beastly teeth?" she quipped. "There's a corrective charm but seeing as yours have grown in so severely crooked, I wouldn't count on a simple spell to fix them."

"Do try to talk when you're on your knees, pet. I love a good hum."

"You're disgusting, Flint."

"I may be, but in the next ten minutes, you'll be too."

She clawed him across the cheek; he'd forgotten to secure her wrists. So, she wasn't going down without a fight…

Her infliction had stung remotely, though not nearly enough for him to recoil. Well, he'd yet to face what did make him flinch. Losing patience, he enclosed her so they weren't separated a centimeter. Feeling the girl fish for her wand, he deftly ripped out his own, jabbing it against her neck, dead-set on cursing her with something nastier than he himself.

"Look, angel, the fact remains that you either die by breaking your committed Vow, you die by me before twelve o'clock tonight or you be a good girl and swallow my cock. There's nothing you or I can do to change the spell, not that I would if I could. I'll be nice and let you take your time. It won't take long, alright?"

Unable to stifle a whimper, she resigned a nod, her back sliding down the wall and her paranoid mind flickering on to trepidation mode. She knelt at his waist, emotionally numb, as her focus blanked. She made no movements, but only sat still, a neurotic mess.

"What're ya waiting for? Unzip it."

Muzzy stars dancing in her gaze, she pinched and tugged at his zipper until a bulged crevice stared at her. She made out little in here as they'd no light source. Marcus could have put on a lumos, but he was probably too caught up in this arousing moment to think such tasking thoughts or execute such rudimentary magic.

She so generously undid the clasping button as well, shakily beginning to peel his trousers down until he murmured for her to keep them at his hips, unless she wished to fondle and taste his nuts too, he side-noted wryly. Exhaling, her composure surely ruined from this moment onwards, she she dug her fingers into the slit of his underpants—her eyes clenched shut—and she managed to acquaint his junk outside where it stood quite erect in the air. Her modest reflexes glued her back to the wall once his individual scent taunted her nostrils.

"Grab me, pet," he grumbled huskily, massaging his hands into her scalp. "Jerk me off."

"Shut up!" she hissed, over and over again repeating in her head the fact that she **had** to do this lest she truly would die that night. She considered the damage that would wreak upon her family if she were to pass away right then and there at her healthy fifteen years with no siblings to fill the void she'd leave. Quietus the ultimatum, she screwed her eyes shut strainingly and inched forward utilizing all the will and bravery she could muster. A deep, guttural groan was secondary to wounding her chastity, the first and foremost the foreign acrid taste and texture lying on her tongue. She had him past her lips for three seconds before she tried brusquely to retreat, but he wouldn't have that. His tenacious hold bound her head in place, the assault unsettling the daylights out of her.

"Don't waste any time now," he ordered hoarsely.

' _I'm in fucking hell.'_

Her expeditious heartbeats were scarcely indicative of the revolving minutes, a hysterical beat equating a millisecond. A guessed four passed with her torturous bobbing, choking and listening to only the dirtiest of swears, and just when she believed she'd faint from heat stroke or suffer lockjaw, the back of her head was clutched forcibly by large fingers as a viscous liquid poured down her throat as he'd directed her to drink every last trickle.

"Such a good girl, Katie," Marcus complemented, rubbing her pads of his fingers into her roots affectionately, releasing her altogether when he was gratified. She scrambled against a corner just a foot back beside squib Filch's mop-occupied pail, breathing manically. He lumos'd their space to study her lusciously plump and reddened lips, unkempt long hair and disturbed, broadened blue eyes. Merlin, the sight was devastatingly alluring. He licked his lips, wondering whether her naughty deed had soddened her panties any. "Get up. I want to return the favor," he muttered.

She returned a glare that augmented her bedraggled beauty. "I did it," she whispered, shaken. "Get out."

"Wasn't as bad as you're making it out to be," he noted coolly, his right hand slapped when touching her hair for but a tick. "How 'bout I even this out and lick your-"

A fiery knuckle thrust at his still bare crotch to erupt a maddening agony. He shielded his hands over his jewels protectively, spitting barbs her way and moving to block the exit when she crawled for it.

"YOU FOUL SPAWN!" she screamed, jumping to her feet and beating on him ferally. "I hated you from the day I first saw you! Cunning, ugly, imbecilic pervert!"

"That's it. Let it all out, sweetheart," he patronized, his arms flaccid at his sides while she pushed and beat her fists at his chest.

"Demented…" Her cowl broke into a snivel, tears gushing down her ample cheeks.

"You referring to yourself there, luv?" he persisted monstrously, stuffing his junk back inside his pants. His ridicule faltered when she knelt to curl up how he'd found her just minutes ago outside the closet, only now she was bawling passionately. Oh. Maybe she was referring to herself. Her rash proposal that they engage in a deal, subsequently binding her to their Vow.

In spite of the savagely throbbing pang in his genitals, her state of hysteria was enrapturing him to weird albeit satisfying proportions. Self-control beyond him, he ripped the inconsolable Gryff to up to treat her to a ravenous snog. He rammed his mouth against hers, almost savoring the salty aftertaste he'd marked her with. Her wrists pinned above her, she writhed, but he'd the ability to restrain her like this for hours. Luckily, he sympathized her enough in this moment to not do so.

She was free and surrounded in stuffy solitude one shove and door-slam-gust later. The space was a humid emblem of reluctant promiscuity fused with her idea of hell, and his heaven; a bargain's end lived up, but she found she couldn't decamp it.


	3. A Witch's Contrite

***In canon, Percy is Head Boy for the '93-94 school year. Here, Oliver is. Just a heads-up.**

Big thanks to those who've reviewed, followed/faved, and to those who are sticking by.

* * *

 **Chapter Three  
** _ **A Witch's Contrite**_

"You're off your head, Katie!" Alicia exclaimed.

"You can't quit Quidditch!" Angelina scolded.

"I can and plan to."

"Is this why you've been so aloof the last four months? Our lose depressed you so much it's maimed your desire to play anymore?" Angelina asked sternly.

"...It's not that."

"And you waited till the day of our second game to make your statement?" Alicia scoffed.

"I've given it a lot of thought."

"We're playing _Hufflepuff_ ," Alicia reasoned. "Godric knows we'll win to them. _And_ there's no way Hooch is going to set loose any jinxed Bludgers again after the last game's repercussions."

"It shouldn't matter _who_ we're playing, Ali. She didn't call quits when we lost our final match last year," Angelina noted, turning a concerned eye to the retiring Chaser. "What's up, Katie?"

' _More like what_ _ **was**_ _up,'_ the blonde mulled darkly. "I've just lost interest for the sport s'all. I'm sure Wood'll have no trouble finding a new Outside Chaser."

"Within three hours?! You _are_ loony, Bell!" Alicia snapped.

"Just play today's game with us," Angelina coaxed. "Then we can talk. Whatever's elicited this sudden change of heart will likely pass."

"My heart's not in it anymore, Ange. It was fun for a while, but I'm better off engrossing my extra time with...different activities."

"Such as?" both girls inquired.

"Like...like the Gobstones Club," Katie offered pathetically. "Or - or-"

"Accommodating the elves in the kitchens?" Alicia snorted, shaking her head in disbelief.

"Did someone threaten you?" Angelina asked. "Scrutinized your lithe technique and considered their potential benefit to playing us if you were not a part of the team any long-"

"No, no, really, you guys. I'm just a bit spent. I might get into it again this fall. In fact, I probably will."

"You've been acting strange, you know," Alicia sighed. "Your face is always beetroot during our meals, and you're quieter than you used to be."

"Did someone _insult_ you?" Angelina tried.

"Alright, I'll play this game," Katie yielded, "but I can't promise either of you that I'll play the final."

"We'll see about that," Alicia put boldly.

...

Uniformed alongside her mates and team, Katie tepidly made for the pitch, obsessively worried that Flint and his cronies would poke their twisted, deviant fun at her from the stands whilst she skittered about in the air dodging 'Puffs. She wouldn't hear any of their obscene mutterings, but the certification by itself ruffled her feathers sufficiently.

' _It's long over, you overly sensitive harlot.'_

"We play by our remodeled strategy, Hufflepuff doesn't stand a chance," Wood declared, leading his crew. "We're stronger, quicker and smarter."

"And not to mention they're dead-scared that Harry'll petrify them if they fly anywhere near 'im," Fred piped in.

"That too," Wood concurred humbly as Professor McGonagall approached them abruptly.

"This match has been cancelled," the elderly witch informed.

One could already see smoke emit out of the Captain's ears. "You can't cancel Quidditch," he argued.

"Silence, Wood. You and your teammates will go to Gryffindor Tower now," she instructed, abandoning the sixth year boy to address Harry. He steamingly obeyed and guided himself and the others off.

Merlin must have answered Katie's prayers.

o0o0o0o

Rather, Merlin must have reflected on the students' well-being because the House Cup was not distributed this year. All of March, April and May's inter-House matches were scrapped for caution regarding the Chamber of Secrets and the 'Heir of Slytherin'. Katie was okay to resume playing in the fall because Flint was due to graduate this year.

Lockhart's divulged chicanery and newfound insanity hopped around the Gryffindor table like the hot news it was during the end of the year's Great Hall feast. Katie valiantly sat facing the Slytherin table just so she could pay an atrociously molared toerag an abominable farewell grimace. Thus far, his charcoal eyes hadn't averted from the parchment he was gripping. Oddly, his expression was one of hurt.

' _The Falcons un-acceptance letter?'_ Katie assumed evilly. ' _The only future he's got will be on the streets of Knockturn Alley as a disoriented, part-time black market-employed derelict.'_

"Hagrid's made it back!" Alicia chanted gleefully, getting everyone to crane their necks towards the hall's entrance where the colossal gamekeeper glowingly tromped forth. Three Houses applauded with zeal that cracked Snape's monotonous ego and had him flinching. Katie, contaminated and spineless as she still felt, pressured her spirits up and clapped supportingly.

Over at the Slytherin table, Marcus goggled at his NEWT results, brooding ponderously. He'd T'd _each_ course? He figured he'd done poorly on Transfiguration and Charms, but he was stunned to review Potions and Defense Against the Dark Arts stamped with the worst grade in the system. Oh, the laughing stock he'd be retaking his seventh year!

"At least you can try to reinforce our lousy stratagem while you're Captain again," Adrian teased.

"Shove it, Pussy," the non-graduate barked. He swallowed the bile that oozed up his chest and sighed through his nostrils. "Ya think Horton would let on a drop-out?"

"Wouldn't count on it. That's illicit for one thing, and you're going to be compared to others who do have their degrees, and therefore, will be adjudged as more assimilated in the field of Quidditch among else."

Marcus snorted. "I've known all there's to know about blasted Quidditch since I was seven!"

"Mm, I'm sure Horton would consider that," Adrian scoffed.

"Damn! Fuck, fuck, **fuck** my fucking life!" Marcus roared, his pounding fist nearly splattering straight into his meatloaf. His act was definitely reminiscent of an actual troll's in some neighboring snakes' eyes.

"Look at the bright side, man," Adrian interjected. "You can torment that little blonde cocksucker for another long year."

"No use, she's shattered," Marcus grumbled dismally. "Became a pessimistic mope from harmless foreplay. Just looks dead most of the time nowadays."

"Not now," Adrian noted, pointing ahead. "She's grinning and rosy-cheeked like she just watched that giant Keeper of the Keys punt Flit-dick across the hall."

Marcus languidly lifted his head to gaze upon the apparently happy Gryff. A scheming, lecherous grin slathered over his face. "Don't suppose I might score her cherry sometime next year?"

"Not without some Imperious," his mate tsked.

"Wanna bet that I'll have Bell before you have Spinnet?" Marcus suggested.

"Please, I'll be all over the mocha tart before you even wreak the tiniest of notions in Bell that she's been burdened with a part-troll stalker."

"For the umpteenth time, there's no troll in my ancestry, you wanker, and I don't and will not stalk the bint."

"You don't classify staring at her back while she eats or following her through the corridors stalking?"

"You're one to speak. Gotta be monitoring me too much if you can thoroughly label me the girl's shadow."

"You down for the wager or not?"

Marcus shrugged. "Sure."

"Now we can't race with this. Gryffindor girls are notorious for their hardheaded and recalcitrant values. Neither of us are right pretending either witch will spread their legs too early in the game."

"Right, this could take years, and I'm here for _just_ one more. I'm seeing to that," Marcus bit.

"Likewise."

"On second thought," Marcus began, examining the newly enlivened witch. "I'm thinking I'll need _over_ a year to...ensnare her heart. Managing to get her knickers at her ankles should take even longer. Alas, she learned her lesson in our closeted tryst."

"Backing out already?"

Marcus disliked his mate's chaffing tone. He disliked it so immensely his second thought was reversed. "To hell with it. You're on."

"Name your price."

o0o0o0o

 _September the first, 1993_

"W-why is _**he**_ here?! Wasn't he supposed to graduate in July?!"

The fifth year girl sputtered and jabbed at Angelina's left arm for twenty seconds before her astonishment simmered down to a level where coherence dominated once more. Upon spotting Flint at the Slytherin table, her equilibrium burst up into a hardly figurative inferno. She surely felt as if she were burning.

"I suspect he bombed his exams," Ange said calmly, presenting her saucer blue-eyed pal with a funny look. "Why's he got your knickers knotted?"

"Oh, er, I - I am just a hint befuddled to see him. It figures. Bloke's too stupid to master anything besides Quidditch tactics."

"I wouldn't say expertise is with him there either, Katie," Ali chipped in. "It doesn't take a lot of brains to whip about the pitch exploiting every foul in the book. Remember when he Blatched himself a match's suspension our second year?"

"The browbeat bruised up Oliver's ribs so bad Hooch contemplated expelling him from the sport," Ange interposed.

"Shame it is we've the troll to elude again this year," Ali sighed.

Hilariously outstretching mere shame it was for Katie according to her history with the man. She dared not pin her sights across the hall. But a single more vulgar sneer from him would land him hexed into oblivion on her liability. His persisting presence flung this school year's ambitions to the gutters. She had to sit on her wand and have naught more than the feast's food in front of her occupy her vision just to refrain from zapping the snaggle-toothed snake a dose of Cruciatus.

Quidditch wouldn't be on her agenda that year.

…

"Your eyes are feasting on more than your gut."

"Cram it. Her tits have grown a bit over the summer, not that I can see them too well with those damned conservative robes draping over 'em."

"Her heart's gonna be all the more challenging to possess if she catches you drooling over her breasts," Adrian lectured, he himself hankering to blindfold his own eyes so as to not leer at Spinnet's full rack.

"Pfft, _breasts_. Ya sound like my grandmother, Pucey. Might as well call 'em mammaries."

"Bear in mind our deal, Mark. Fifty galleons are to be deposited to my Gringotts by the third of July next year."

"Right," he scoffed. "Why don't you bear in mind that once Katie catches a whiff of my pheromones she'll fall on my dick, hell, and probably be down for sucking me again at my command. Merlin knows she needs the practice."

Adrian noticed how he'd used the girl's first name rather than final, but put off mentioning it. "You never did relate much of her performance. Was she sloppy?"

Marcus chuckled, hardening a notch at the reminiscence. "She was fair enough. That gag reflex got annoying, but it didn't impede the job from finishing to my liking."

"A real nefarious bastard, you are. Didn't harbor the slightest sliver of guilt, did you?"

Marcus was far too man to admit to such weakness. "Nah."

Adrian snickered, no saint himself. "May the best wizard prevail."

"Aye."

He eyed his golden-haired objective as she huddled with her little friends towards the Great Hall's exit. He was adamant on resting a wooed impression in her as soon as possible. Delaying this would only make garnering her disposed attention and genitalia increasingly nonviable. Befriending her opportunely was crucial and similarly beneficial, but just how he'd accomplish that had him remarkably stupefied. On his stalking patrols earlier that year he'd examined her sad transformation in character. From that night in October when he'd tainted her to late June he'd read the shame and self-repulsion he's shrouded her with. She'd made like an outcast bookworm, shunning her friends and keeping her eyes on the floor as if looking at anything otherwise would petrify her. Well, that risk was putted against everyone at the time.

Even he, the arrogant, prejudiced, alleged troll laid awake in his bed deep into the nightfall obsessively wondering if he'd encumbered Bell with insomnia, as her daytime disquietude was distinct. She'd seemed to finally chipper up, but that was bound to tumble downhill the minute he encountered her, though he had to nevertheless.

o0o0o0o

In spite of her creeping out of her boohoo shell, the library remained a regular habitat of Katie's. Her nose was frequently dipped into a book that differed vastly from sex positions, Marcus knew, and she always did this standing alone or occasionally with one of her girlfriends behind some bookshelf like she sensed her admirer was loitering her midst to peel his glints onto her the tick she plopped into an armchair or at a table. Although he couldn't very well see her, he sat around spying regardless, slowly massing the courage to face her like some dithering third year Hufflepuss.

After two hours of skulking, his head propped by his hand while he did really nothing at all, Madam Pince would take note and gauge him with suspicion, and once he was suspicious she was suspicious, a line was drawn.

' _To fucking hell with forfeiting forty galleons.'_

His tingling, sleeping feet were in motion before his brain was, just about landing him flat on his face, but he stayed afoot, treading for the bookshelf ahead numbly. Improvisation would do, and his old shenanigans and ejaculation could be alleviated with a little smooth talking, he hoped, however, Bell abstracted from the tehe-ing bimbos he was aware of. Bell was a school girl, not a schoolgirl.

Rounding the shelf to stand several feet from her, he cleared his throat to illuminate his arrival. Burgundy cheeks, a shrill gasp and a ready wand were promptly flaunted for him, yet he sought it obligatory to smile big and raise his hands in mocking defense.

"You do this for every bloke who confronts you?"

"You stay the hell away from me," she snapped, making eye contact with him for the first time in roughly eleven months. She was captivating from afar, but up-close he could enjoy the three buttons on her school blouse that were undone and showing the paltriest of cleavage.

"Just want a word, Bell."

"Piss off."

'" _You should be grateful I didn't piss down your throat,"'_ he almost blurted, but recalled prodding slurs were no efficient method to instigating a friendship nor a sexual relationship. Respecting her plea could vouchsafe him her trust in the latter.

"I'll see you our respective Houses' game day," he toodle-ooed with a semi genuine smile.

She trained her wand on him until he was out of the library, no longer visible but surely lurking in the hall outside. Paranoid, she journeyed up to the seventh floor brandishing her wand in her right hand, extremely chary, until she was sheltered in her common room. She'd ascended five steps when Oliver hollered for her approach.

Ange nor Ali had transferred Katie's vocalized contemplation to retire from their devoted sport to Wood because the claim _had_ to be rubbish. Katie soared as a deft bird! All her third year she'd yakked about one day playing for the Holyhead Harpies. If that dream was unscathed to date then Katie would reap advantages playing a complete six years for Gryffindor. And sudden cold feet were simply nonsensical.

"Evening, Kat," the seventh year Scot greeted. "I'd just like to brief you on our annual Quidditch conference's relocation. Same day, the thirteenth at seven o'clock p.m., but in my Head dormitory on the fifth floor." He grinned prettily, an honored Head Boy. "The password is bubble-mint sphinx."

"Thanks, Oliver. I'll be there," Katie said, feigning a small smile.

"I've got a kick-arse hunch for this season," he enthused. "I'd lay humongous odds we're having at that Cup this year."

' _Careful there,'_ she thought automatically, grimly trancing on her lamented six-minute-long excursion of the hostile netherworld, also known as her fellating the execrable devil. She would have made a joke pertaining Flint, but the guy's lone name ingrained debilitating unease.

Quidditch the topic, now would have been a superbly convenient instance to brief Oliver on her unresolved contemplations. Seeing as Katie inherited a phobia for trolls succeeding November fourteenth of the year before, competing against one on the pitch intimidated her to measures mighty enough to stoop her to a quite un-Gryff-like cower. The cowardice in itself annoyed her to tears, but it was there and too real to ignore.

But he looked so thrilled. Should she cough her means instantaneously so he can hunt for a fresh replacement in advance? Should she withhold and tell him at the last minute? Maybe she could play the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff matches and simulate a migraine or concoct and guzzle a fever-triggering brew on the day of Slytherin's? Steering distant of him shamed her plucky core, but with the damage's severity came aftermaths of the like.

The Captain was on his merry egress too soon, rendering her trap sealed.

…

"Why should we swap tips on how we're to reap the fancies of our respective quarries when we're gambling against one another?" Adrian scoffed. It appeared no wonder his best mate was back to repeat his seventh year.

"Because...because face it, man. Both bints are equally pigheaded," Marcus reasoned. "You really think you can sweep Spinnet off her feet with your 'suave verbal flow' and 'debonair'?"

"She sweeps herself into the air just exceptionally on her own as I've observed meticulously from third year onwards," the lankier snake replied smoothly, reflecting on just one of a number of his bountiful speculations towards the girl.

"You've got that right," the elder snickered. "I remember that day in your fourth year when you tried to sneak into Wood's Chasers' locker room after their game with us." Prodigious, ragged, grayish teeth exposed themselves, as did wheezy giggles. "Couch about booted you from the team like you were a hunk of shite!"

"You tagged along…" Adrian reminded, a bemused light brunet brow rising. "She about debarred either of us, you forgetful goon."

Marcus cleared his throat awkwardly, muttering a silent, "Oh, yeah," for him to tsk at. "Anyhow, Bell and Spinnet see us as great arseholes so getting them to submit willingly should prove laborious. Trading tricks and pointers every so often oughta better empower me and you."

"Then where would lie our bargain's purpose? You're insecure, aren't you? I'm sure Bell detests you more than anybody or anything else after what you coerced her into doing. Contrariwise, my link with Alicia is near immaculate because our antagonized friction is based upon our game dueling and isn't exactly personal. The slimmest likelihood where Bell would've relented herself as your property drained when she defiled herself by blowing you."

"She asked for it!" Marcus objected, straining the feeble, trollish fuses in his brain to jog to memory her instigated proposal. "Bitch outright suggested the bet, you know that. I owed her twenty galleons in the scenario we lost, and since we didn't, she-"

"Yes, yes, don't waste your breath; I was right there Bonding you two."

Marcus plopped onto his mattress as Miles intruded the dorm briefly to pick up his book bag. "You gonna attempt a similar wager with your witch?" he queried.

"Hell no."

"Why?"

"I'm too large a gent to flirt so churlishly with a lady."

"You saying I was dishonorable to condone what Bell swore on her life to do?"

"To an extent…"

Marcus tsked. "You were chortling with me that day. You didn't appear too criticizing to me."

"How old was she?"

He shrugged. "Dunno precisely. Probably fifteen or sixteen. It matters not diddly. She was in it committedly."

"Have you thought of the trauma you've likely induced in her? Not that I've paid loads of attention to the girl, but I can perceive from what ganders I've had she's downright morose."

"Aren't we the bona fide analyst here," the other scoffed. "Yeah, I've taken some notice."

Adrian returned a scoff. "She's completely isolated herself, Mark, in her acute disgust, I take. I'm shocked she hasn't confided in her friends what you'd inveigled her into carrying out."

"How'dya know she hasn't?"

"You'd be long obliterated from the blistering wrath of her fellow Chasers."

"They couldn't take me."

"Not physically, but you'd be ashes by the end of their wands in all sincerity."

"You concluding that built on Spinnet's hexing your arse silly after you smacked hers your fifth year?"

"Rightly so," Adrian conceded pridefully. "She's quite the hellcat in her vengeful casting."

"You aspiring for such in bed with her too?"

He nodded and smirked with poise. "As eventual as such will be."

"Indeed," Marcus sighed.

o0o0o0o

Explicit reveries of Flint blocked out the hub of Wood's Head dorm-held oration, robbing her clean of her attentiveness. How was Katie's mind to house anything that her prospective _ex_ -Captain swanked when Flint was now all she could associate with the sport? Her obscene muse piqued its overdrive when the Keeper reflected on that 'blow to the head' he suffered a handful of years ago. Beyond her control, she gasped loudly, flushing crimson as a certain Slytherin's thick, swollen groin obscured her vision as it had that night on her knees.

"Everything well, Katie?" Oliver paused to ask.

"Er—please pardon me," she huffed, fleeing the posh dorm.

Inhaling and exhaling shakily behind a recess the floor below, Katie roughly wiped at her leaking waterworks and cursed at the revolting images currently and unremittingly flooding her mind. Minutes after Flint had left her be in that closet, she'd plucked the courage to vomit in the sixth floor girls' lavatory and then swish and swill three fourths of her bottle of mouthwash. She'd cried softly into her pillow to go unheard by her roommates and slept that night none.

Upon undergoing a helping of introspection, she sniffled boisterously and straightened her posture. Aged as her regretted kinky maneuver was, the disintegrating remnants of her self-respect and nausea refused to fade. Her sole account of reprisal was displayed through her bashing him in the closet, then she'd sidestepped him—and her friends—over an extensive period, mainly owing to her anguish and horror that Ali and Ange would somehow discover her grimy affair, and thereby, disown her like she'd disowned herself.

He was due for comeuppance, absolutely. She'd inject a bottle of firewhiskey with samples of the Drink of Despair, Alihotsy Draught, Babbling Beverage, Essence of Insanity, Jawbind and Laxative elixirs and have it delivered to his dorm...somehow. Perhaps she'd ask to borrow Harry's invisibility cloak and risk the common room invasion herself. Whatever the method, she'd see to it.


	4. A Saccharine Reprisal

**Chapter Four  
** _ **A Saccharine Reprisal**_

Katie's mum, Belinda, a pureblooded witch and co-owner of Diagon Alley's Rosa Lee Teabag shop, taught her only child that the ideal moral to apply to life is to monitor your altercations and make peace with those whom are unique in outwardly and bluntly cynical senses. Hoarding foes would posit Katie nowhere harmonious.

Bartholomew Bell, a middle-aged muggle insurance salesman, went by standing strong for his beliefs and upholding even ground with those who paraded their vanity, and if assaulted, retaliate just to the degree which assaulted. And yes, Belinda's tip was appropriate; having enemies was detrimental to the soul and pointless as long as the parties were resolved.

Feeling utterly assaulted and a wicked gap from even ground with Flint, she poured an ounce of her freshly fermented Alihotsy into the bottle of firewhiskey she'd smuggled from her common room's celebration cupboard. It had totaled a week and a half to assemble every ingredient for every potion she was to prepare. The measurements were not exact, but none of these fluids bore poison, just ailing side-effects. The sparse and unwelcome fluids added into the alcohol shouldn't have been potent enough for him to taste and luckily, if the troll chugged down just enough, (as he was sure to) the effects would execute entirely, rendering him a lachrymose, jaw-locked, ferociously puking, incoherently blathering, diarrhea-whamming mass of hysteria all in delicious unison.

Katie sat criss-cross in Moaning Myrtle's lavatory on the first floor as she concocted all six potions in her pewter cauldron. Tolerating the john's eternal haunter grew tiresome after seventy minutes of hearing erratic, pitching titters and interrogations of whom the virulent elixir was for.

"Why won't cranky Kathy tell me who she's meaning to get very, very sick?" the ghost cooed into the mortal's left ear, to be returned a swat, for her vapory translucency chilled Katie's flesh.

"I can't tell you because you'll rat on me, and you know it," the blonde responded casually, uncorking the firewhiskey to tap the ounce of Alihotsy in.

"But I could rat on your clandestine actions anyhow," the dead Ravenclaw quipped. "It's after midnight, you're not a prefect, and your intentions to sicken somebody are mountainously illegal within school grounds!"

"Who's going to believe you?"

"Mr. Filch and Mrs. Norris, and probably Professor Snape."

"If I tell you, you're not to tell anyone, alright?" Katie sighed.

"I might let slip a peep…" Myrtle squeaked giddily.

"No, _nothing_ , Myrtle," Katie snapped. "Can't you keep a secret for me?"

"On one condition."

"Cripes." Katie rolled her eyes, chastising her choice in covert brewing location. "Spill it then."

"I've been incarcerated in this blasted castle for nearly fifty-one years, mind you. Olive Hornby bullied me senseless up till the day I died right by that stall over there, so I haunted the meanie with the same ruthlessness she'd haunted me with for three years! Tragically, my sweet amusement havocking her life came to an end when she turned seventeen and exercised herself of me at the Ministry," she huffed, "possibly 'cause I made a ruckus at her older brother's wedding. Now she must be around sixty-five and will be dying give another forty or so years unless she dies sooner in some accident…" The spirit simpered nastily. "I need you to owl the Ministry a complain of my imprisonment. Do slather the letter with the truth of how _miserable_ I am. Show me when it's all inked up and spectacular then go on and ship it."

"Myrtle, I hardly take I'll be able to convince the Ministry to release you," Katie reasoned.

"The endeavor by itself will suffice for me. You're the first person to come down here in quite some time and I do miss terrorizing my old hector. With Peeves' constant picking on me I could just perish all over again, but floating about, pestering old Olive, her husband, her children and grandchildren is just the liberation I could use, Kathy B."

"Very well. I'll do it."

"You'll do it this week too! You're to report back to me on Monday for approval. If you do not come, I shall tattle you off to Mr.-"

"Yes, yes, blast, you can count on me."

"Oh, marvelous! Let's have that tale now." Myrtle sank down to the floor to lay on her stomach beside the cauldron, one hand supporting her chin while she gazed up at the Gryff intently.

Myrtle was awful childish, so Katie opted to sugarcoat the explicit story. "A very rude and selfish Slytherin bragged about the latest edition in Nimbus broomsticks last year while I was practicing with my Quidditch team, so I pointed out that they are likely just placebos. Disagreeing with my theory, he lured me out of my common room some time into the night to-"

"Whooooo? Who is the gentleman?" Myrtle chirped dreamily.

"Marcus Flint."

"Rings a bell…Forgive the pun..." the entity clicked her tongue in thought. "A handsome boy with ghastly teeth used to copulate with a chubby girl by the name of Agatha Crabbe in that stall over there. I'd hide and watch if I was bored enough, but when they got too gross, I'd-"

"Don't want to hear it!" the blonde hissed. "To shorten this up, I challenged him to a wager when I could have sworn on my mum's grave that we would trounce Slytherin in our match with them. I was foolishly dogged while he was, and still is, a great conceited bastard. We ended up losing because a tampered Bludger knocked Harry off his broom and that Malfoy jerk caught the Snitch, hence boosting their score by one hundred and fifty points—ultimately winning them the game."

"I remember how Quidditch works. I was a student here only five decades ago."

"I owed him...a favor, a dreaded one. One that I came to solemnly regret. I only followed through with it because I'd joined him in an Unbreakable Vow so, _so_ densely. My life was put on the line." She blushed and went rigid, remnants of those several minutes tiding yet again. "I've never hated myself more for anything otherwise."

"What was it you had to do?"

"...Kiss him."

"Phooey!"

"I kid you not. It was a - a French kiss. He slobbered on my lips."

"I may have died young and naive, but I can gather your fee was something direr than a measly smooch."

"We'll let rest your assumptions there. No one else knows except for him and his friend, unless they gossiped our exchange out. I doubt they did. Surely at least one Slytherin would've bedeviled me had word unfurled."

"But why is Kathy B inducing maladies to the mean boy nooow? What's with the big delay?"

"He was set to graduate last summer, but as he's critically feeble-minded, he failed his NEWTs and is now repeating his seventh year. As of late, he's been hounding me through the halls, gawking at me, relentlessly goading..." She thought on his recent mocking, lewd and overstated back-and-forth hand signaled blowjob reenactments from afar, which he'd exhibited for her on multiple accounts, whether in the library or a courtyard. "He's intimidated me with how in love he is with what dominance he thinks he has over me." She shook her head, repulsed as per usual. "This ought to put him in his place."

"Ooh, conniving, we are!" Myrtle clapped her incorporeal hands together gleefully. "Are we sending it to him in person?"

"Goodness, no. It'll be 'gifted' to him by an 'anonymous devotee'."

"But what if he takes a hint?"

"Well, he is going to suspect either Wood or me, profoundly dumb as he is. Any rate, I've my wand handy." Katie grinned sinfully, mixing in an ounce of the finished Laxative elixir. "I'm just striving for his agony."

"As am I with Hornet," the bespectacled brunette sniggered.

"Cheers to us both," Katie said.

o0o0o0o

September's twentieth morning featured Adrian practically drooling over his toast, his eyeful of Spinnet toothsome with her cherry glossed lips and fat knockers. He forked at his eggs absentmindedly, his blinking at a minimum, while Marcus looked at him as he would any nutter.

"Wouldn't let her spot your eyes on her like that," the eighth year advised. "It'll be all the harder to lay her if she dubs ya a perverted wanker."

"You're one to speak. How are you to go about even glimpsing at your girl a mile off with a pair of omnioculars free of her vindictive charge?"

"Figure it out," Marcus mumbled. "...'Ventually."

"The clock's ticking, mate. Your stance with Bell is very below par, whereas Alicia and I are-"

"Not exactly acquaintances," Marcus finished for him.

Adrian huffed, casting his goggle away from the opposing Chaser. "Perhaps not given our _past_ confrontations, but I'm opting to morph our rough terms damn soon here."

"You best hustle. I don't wanna see you treating Spinnet like she's one of our team come our match with the Gryffs."

"We don't play them till spring this season," Adrian complacently noted. "I've plenty of time to warm up to her off the pitch, so once we're on the pitch, our game play opposition shouldn't be personal."

"We'll see. I've just got to give a pretend sorry to Bell and she n' I'll be right as rain."

"You think she's that dull?"

"Prolly is. Women are just as mentally inferior to men as they are physically."

"That's a right hackneyed low blow, Mark. Not even I deem ladies as such."

Marcus tsked. "You sure do if ya believe Spinnet will ever fall for you. You must take her an idiot with the faith you have that she'll strip and sprawl out in bed for you."

"Well, I ought to befriend her firstly, that I reckoned from the tick our wager was established."

"Staring at her day in and day out isn't an ideal way to go 'bout that. I've at least tried to talk to Bell once so far this year, and although it was of no profit, I'm trying again. Hell, think I shall today, in fact."

Adrian shrugged. "You've a point. I best pick up the pace myself. I fancy Spinnet, but I'm not failing my NEWTs for her if she hasn't swooned for me by nine months."

Marcus contained his frustration. The longer he was trapped here the greater his craving was to jump back two months and pound the living daylights out of himself for 'meh'ing his exams. Now all he had to look forward to was reconstructing his naturally crude persona with a gentleman's touch to suit Bell's bias. Shelved were his professional Quidditch plans so he could relive his seventh year by the day, ruddy waste of his time that is was.

As everyone began pouring out into the hall, Katie leveled her eyes with his leering stony grays. Marcus smiled strangely wide for her, to be delivered a middle finger and scowl. Adrian's snicker was wiped away with a murderous backhand.

...

Katie deftly picked off a sixth year Slytherin girl's blonde strand of hair from her robe to treasure until that dusk when she could tiptoe down to Myrtle's bathroom and commence brewing a Polyjuice Potion. Wearing a snake's skin in a snake's quarters outshone a lion's in unwelcome territory by a long haul. A month forward, when the potion would be ready, she'd chug it, step into the common room with some ally Slyths with her additive'd firewhiskey addressed to the victim of well-overdue reprisal, ask where his dorm was, and drop it off at his door. She go about her extra fifty or so minutes as another hiding out in a bathroom stall, likely with Myrtle.

Woefully, she wouldn't get to first-handedly exhibit his agonizing fit, but just knowing of it was righteous. Quite motivated and feeling much better, her damaged ego finally healing, she set out for the Black Lake to harvest some leeches.

o0o0o0o

 _Mid-October_

The last table to the far-back right of her classroom was the first to draw Professor Trelawney's insightful eye upon exiting her office. There, hooligans' Mr. Flint, Mr. Pucey and Mr. Bole were chatting amongst each other while missiling spitballs and blowing their shredded tea leaves at a nearby Hufflepuff boy. The Seer, wholeheartedly relying on her Sight, skittered over to the Slytherins and cleared her throat before rapping at the eighth year's shoulder.

"M-mr. Flint! I recommend that you very, very heedfully watch what you ingest inside the next fortnight."

He regarded her with normal-for-a-student-of-her's incredulity. "How come?"

Her round greens zipped back and forth, then rested on the ceiling scrutinizingly, as if she were perusing it. "There are _puddles_ of bile—a _variety_ of bodily fluids—at first dampening—then drenching!—Oh...what's this? Gibberish…and an unstoppable and unstinting state of craze...The bile...it lies in a laxative." She gazed at him. "Do you suffer from constipation, my dear?"

Spittle sprayed over the fine tablecloth, Adrian and Lucian's sniggering blunt. "No," Marcus muttered, his cheeks inadvertently flushing.

"I warn you to decline anyone's offering of the substance, whether in potion, pill or powder form," she said, wagging her index finger at him like a mother to a naughty child.

"Er...'Kay."

"Keep a sharp eye over your meals and snacks to ensure nobody's meddling with them, and sniff your every bite for precaution, just for the next fourteen days."

The Captain tsked, trying to take nil of this crap to heart. "You're saying I should limit and think charily about whatever I stuff in my mouth?"

"You take a single nibble or sip from the contaminated dish or drink, you are plagued the sourest stomach you've ever bore, an incoherent mind, acute melancholy and a locked jaw—all at once, taking course at the same time."

"Bollocks...Is that what you're seeing?"

Lucian and Adrian looked at him weirdly for seeming to suppose her cuckoo prophecy legit.

"They transpire in flashes, but are _always_ guaranteeing…" Sybill twirled to search-out a newly with-child Ravenclaw girl. She excused herself to regale and congratulate the unknowing student on her unintended case of gestation.

"You realize she's bullshitting, yeah?" Lucian said.

"Her 'predictions' are bogus," Adrian scoffed. "Just think back to when she 'foretold' Cassius taking a Bludger to his left shoulder Luce and I's third year. He ended up taking it to the right."

Marcus blanched. "Ya guys really think she's just yanking my chain?"

Either gave a light nod. "Maybe eat careful, though," Lucian suggested. "Just to be safe, y'know?"

…

As a fortnight neared its death, Marcus felt assured that his Divination prof was only a certifiable loon. After five days of picking at his food and asking his buds to sniff his bacon once he thoroughly did first like some dwelling worry-wart, he cut the ridiculousness and carried on regularly with his face-stuffing.

Meanwhile, Katie had topped off her Polyjuice and selected the night of the twenty-seventh to begrudgingly gulp down three tablespoons in Myrtle's bathroom. She gripped a basin's porcelain sides while gaping into the mirror. She'd felt and viewed her hair shorten and thicken, her eyes shade hazel, her heart-shaped face realign squarely, her frame gain fifteen pounds and lose two inches in height, her bosoms swell two full cups more, her nose shrink and widen slightly, and her lips get plumper and tint a lighter pink. All that remained consistent was her pasty skin tone and blonde hair.

"Okay...okay, I can do this," she murmured to herself to boost the valor of the innermost Gryff that hadn't morphed. These changes were only skin-deep and temporary, she continuously reassured herself as she made a beeline for the dungeons.

The dungeons had a grim ambiance that never ceased to fluster the witch, not even now, as she sported an inhabitant's exterior and was all but shunned in the region. She walked behind a trio of snakes for several minutes, hoping they were headed for their common room, wherever that be. They gathered by a sizable stone wall and one uttered their password. Katie rushed in with them when the wall separated, tensing less, as her ruse was progressing smoothly thus far.

Descending the concrete-paved stairs, she parted her robe's hood over her head so as to go unnoticed, and she fleetingly observed the pit, praying her eyes wouldn't meet with who was currently her reflection. Frankly, she hadn't expected the lounge to be so elegant, with its sweeping hearth and its adjoining button-tufted leather furniture, the viridescent lamps decorating the ceiling amid a chandelier, the depths of the Black Lake outside the windows that basked the area in a murky glow and the candle-lit human skulls peppering a series of work tables. The atmosphere was prepossessing, albeit coldly so. The cozy circular boundaries of her own lounge were still a significant length up her alley.

Just passing the hearth, a girl who'd apparently known her costume obstructed her path. "Gemma..I thought I just saw you leave for your prefect duties a few minutes ago."

Improvisation was heftily in order. "Um, someone gave me this," she lifted the firewhiskey, "to deliver to Marcus. He's switched dorms, hasn't he?"

The other serpent nodded. "He's rooming with Adrian, Lucian, Miles and Cassius down there, second-to-last door on the left…Are you feeling alright? Your voice sounds...odd. Different. Have you a bug?"

"I'm fine, thanks." Katie dashed down to where she was directed and placed Flint's present at the door. She vanished in a span of several moments, marking no trace.

…

A tall, black, glass bottle toppled over upon being struck by the opening door. Cassius grabbed it, read its tag and turned to say, "Got some firewhiskey for you, Mark."

"From who?" Marcus grumbled, taking hold of it to study its tag dubiously. "Anonymous devotee?"

"I'll be damned! Guess Trelawney ain't that sick in the brain after all," Lucian said.

"Hell are ya yakking about, Bole?" Marcus muttered, popping his gifted cork off.

"Don't be crass, man," Adrian scoffed. "That firewhiskey's obviously what the lady was referring to. It's tainted."

Marcus took a slow and deliberate snort of his treat. "Smells normal to me. 'Lawn's off her rocker."

"Mate, this random donation is awful suspicious, wouldn't you agree?" Adrian rationalized, assuming he'd have to _confiscate_ the booze from his overly inconsiderate friend. "I strongly recommend you trash that. We're of age. Let's just go out to the Hog's Head this weekend and-"

"You're too paranoid, brethren." Marcus bared many unsightly teeth as he beamed in awe. "Got myself a secret devotee, I do."

Adrian gulped. "Mark-"

"Bottoms up."

Alarm silently sheathed all four roommates at the visual of the eighth year's quaffing, a chunky portion of the liquid down his hatch in fewer than ten secs. The world in the guzzler's perspective then plunged for chaos almost instantaneously as he spat pure balderdash, his stomach rumbling growly trouble.

Miles and Lucian ducked for cover on the floor behind Cassius' four-poster while Adrian and Cassius straightened themselves against the wall beside Miles' wardrobe. Marcus' single, thunderous belch told him to scramble for the common room toilet outside their dorm roughly thirty feet away. He virtually made it.

Latching the stall up for privacy was too gigantic a task when one was on the verge of blasting feces in their pants, Marcus briskly reasoned, his bowels brutally destructive, and his gut as well, as barf spewed from his mouth at quite a momentum. Incoherent words and puke spurted ahead of him and the toilet bowl was muddied in a similar fashion. Amid the excessive nausea, despair shrouded him like a blanket that rubbed off suicide-encouraging spells.

Two torturous hours were counted by Adrian as he, like the solicitous pal he was, stood guard at the end of the lavatory to shoo away anyone who tried to come in to expel their own presumably non-violent piss or dump. Adrian listened to his mate of early childhood cry, something he'd never before heard him do. He wouldn't doubt this wasn't his first time doing such. Mark wasn't a sissy, not even now, because his tears were but treacherous effects of some potion that'd he'd been illicitly dosed.

Adrian knew when the elder Chaser's bodily eruption faltered. It had when Mark shouted at the top of his lungs a sobering line of how that cunt was gonna fucking get it.


End file.
